Thanksgiving ... Christmas .. it's almost on us, get ready!!

School's back soon, Thanksgiving is nearly on us and Christmas is just round the corner. The key to a good celebratory dinner, for killing indigenous American Indians, birth of Jesus, arrival of the SATS scores ..... and Aldi are selling long lasting non-biodegradeable plastic punnets of 5 gorgeous, plump, fingerlickin' good , Spanish nectarines for 59p each.

So we need a bag of sugar (74p) a bottle of Aldi's best Brandy (£11.85) - lemon grass flavouring and bay leaves to flavour by choice.

1.Wash 15 (ish) nectarines carefully, put in boiling water for 2-3 minutes. Skin them or leave it on, it doesn't matter. Halve and stone, set aside.
2. Make syrup with water (300ml)and sugar (225g), slowly stir and bring to boil. (Add lemon grass / bay leaves or maybe a vanilla pod )
3. Poach all the nectarines for a few minutes then remove with a slotted spoon . Remove the bay leaves and lemon grass if used.
4. Place nectarines in 2 Sterilised Kilner jars - hot wash in dishwasher or boil in water or heat in warm stove at 180 degrees.
4. Add Brandy to syrup to make a 50/50 mix, when cooled , pour over nectarines and fill up jars with remaining brandy.
5. Allow to cool, put lids on and leave in cool place - garage is ideal.

Serving suggestion : Take several halves, pour syrup over, place lump of clotted cream or Haagen Daz vanilla ice cream (or both). If they taste good, have some more...then sleep.

See a Waitrose recipe here. The peaches and apricots look good too - recipe here

So that's about £15 quid for a memorable dessert for 8 people that needs no further preparation.

Easy peasy.